Ride sharing revs up

Monday

Jun 30, 2008 at 12:01 AMJun 30, 2008 at 12:48 AM

Companies are working to ease commuting costs with mass transit subsidies and carpools.

Steve Adams

More commuters are ditching their cars and climbing aboard corporate shuttle buses as employers make it easier to commute to suburban office parks. Ridership on Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts’ shuttles from MBTA stations to offices in Quincy and Hingham is up nearly 15 percent from last year.

Toting a tray of Dunkin’ Donuts iced coffee, Jen Louie of Quincy disembarked from the shuttle in Hingham on Thursday morning. Louie takes the Red Line from North Quincy to Braintree and picks up the shuttle for the ride to the Technology Park Drive office. Her commute usually takes 30 minutes.

“It’s free, and it’s always on time,” said Louie, a supervisor for Blue Cross.

More employees are signing up for carpooling programs, according to transportation consultants, as the prospect of persistent $4-a-gallon gas burns a hole in household budgets.

A survey of human resources managers last month indicated that employers are gradually taking steps to ease the commuting burden. Nearly 23 percent of the companies contacted said they are offering condensed workweeks, such as a four-day, 10-hour-per-day arrangement, Chicago outplacement consultants Challenger, Gray & Christmas reported.

South Shore Transportation Management Association, a nonprofit partnership between local industry and state agencies, launched a new shuttle service when Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts opened its 325,000-square-foot office building in Hingham last August. Nearly 1,000 people work at the complex.

About 400 Blue Cross employees ride the free shuttle each week from the Braintree MBTA station to the Hingham campus. About 800 more take a shuttle to its Quincy offices from the North Quincy MBTA station.

The service is run by A&A Metro Transportation of Bridgewater, which provides corporate shuttles for nine companies south of Boston. From January through June 1, ridership on the company’s shuttles was up 10.5 percent compared with the same time in 2007, operations manager Joe McCallum said.

Although the Hingham shuttle serves only the Blue Cross facility, there are discussions about expanding it to other nearby employers, said John Stobierski, vice president of the South Shore Chamber of Commerce in Quincy.

The program also includes a ride-matching program and emergency ride service for employees who have to work late or leave early for a family emergency.

The service offers 21 trips daily between Royall Street and the Quincy Center and Ashmont MBTA stations. Employees of companies that do not subsidize the service pay $2 per ride.

The service began in 2007 after the Neponset Valley TMA received a state Highway Department grant.

“It gives an opportunity for individuals who live outside the suburbs to have access to those companies,” said Dustin Rhue, director of the transportation management association. “They really aren’t centrally located near commuter rail or subway and that blocks off individuals who want to use mass transit.”

In April, the Canton shuttle bus attracted 1,797 riders, Rhue said. A second shuttle from the University Avenue MBTA station had 1,005 riders in April. Ridership is comparable to 2007 levels, Rhue said.

Ride-matching programs that connect potential carpoolers with each other also are gaining in popularity.

TransAction Associates, a Waltham company that manages ride-share programs for companies, saw a recent spike in registrations for ride-matching, with more than 250 new sign-ups in the last 10 days, President Cindy Frene said.

“We’re getting an incredible amount of action,” she said. “It’s great because people are definitely looking for an option.”

Since the 1990s, Tufts Medical Center has allowed employees to buy subsidized MBTA passes, with the current subsidy 25 percent on monthly passes up to $40, spokeswoman Julie Jette said. About 20 additional employees are taking advantage of the program this year compared with last year.

Tufts also is waiving the fee to place classified ads for carpools in its employee newsletter.

Canton’s Dunkin’ Brands allows employees to find carpool partners on its internal Web site, spokesman Andrew Mastrangelo said. It offers flexible work schedules to employees on a case-by-case basis, but not in a direct response to the commuter crunch, Mastrangelo said.

The Challenger, Gray & Christmas survey also showed lingering corporate inertia amid the gas crisis, with nearly 43 percent of companies saying they hadn’t taken any steps to cushion the effects. More than a third said job candidates turned down offers because of long commutes.